Severe Thunderstorm Watch Issued In 4 Eastern PA Counties

PHILADELPHIA, PA — A severe thunderstorm watch is in place for four Philadelphia-area counties, including Montgomery, Chester, Delaware and Philadelphia. The watch goes through 11 p.m. Monday.

A flash flood watch is also in place through Tuesday morning.

The National Weather Service already had issued hazardous weather outlook for nearly the entire region, saying there's a chance of severe storms, with the main risk being damaging winds.

The environment will be favorable for torrential rainfall with these storms, according to the NWS. Additionally, storms may begin to track over the same locations as a very slow-moving front allows for the redevelopment of bad weather. There is potential for one to three inches of rain in a very short period of time where the strongest storms occur.

AccuWeather also says that thunderstorms will pulse and become locally severe from the central Appalachians to the mid-Atlantic coast on Monday.

The storms will mostly rumble in parts of West Virginia, southern Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, southern New Jersey and northern and central Virginia, according to AccuWeather. Lightning poses the most widespread risk to people and pets outdoors.

A few of the strongest thunderstorms can produce a tornado, according to AccuWeather. While the tornado risk is low for any one location, the chance of such a storm is greatest from the mid-afternoon to the early-evening hours. In some cases, the tornado may be wrapped in rain and difficult to spot.

A small number of locations may be hit with pea- to golf ball-sized hail as well, according to AccuWeather. On Tuesday, the risk of locally severe thunderstorms will shift a bit farther to the south.

With reporting by Tom Davis